Right-click anywhere on the desktop. Select New > Shortcut from the menu. Type %windir%\system32\eudcedit.exe in the field. Click Next to advance to the screen where you give a name to the shortcut. Press Finish to set up the shortcut on your desktop.

You can always pin the window to the Start menu or the taskbar for faster access.

Explore the Private Character Editor Window

PCE starts with a Select Code window. This window associates the character you are about to create with a specific place in the Windows character library. The funny numbers on the Select Code grid are hexadecimal codes that will be allotted to your new character.

For instance, if you choose the first box, the code will be E000. If you pick the box from the second column and the first row, the code will be E001. Select any of the little gray boxes and click on OK.

Note: By default, PCE uses the Unicode character set.

The interface of the editor is barebones with a grid drawing area and the drawing toolbar with 10 tools on the left. You can also access the drawing tools from the Tools menu. The grid represents the total area of a character measuring 64 x 64. Each character that you draw becomes a black and white bitmap (*.bmp).

The drawing area is simple enough for a third grader to understand but the actual drawing takes a calligraphist’s hand. My efforts below will show that I am certainly not one.

It takes a lot to use the mouse as a brush. Use the left mouse button to draw in black and the right one for white. This basic interface is enough if you want to create your own typeface. But imagine the endurance and effort!

So, stick to simple symbols that you can use as a “stamp” or a special typeface for an email signature.

Here are two things you can do when you don’t want to start from scratch.

1. You can use an existing character as a template to create a new character.

Copy the existing character to the grid. Go to Edit > Copy Character. And then change it with the tools at your disposal. The existing character can also be used as a visual guide in a Reference window next to the Edit Grid (Select Window > Reference).

We will look into this method in detail below.

2. You can copy and paste bitmap selections between the PCE and other bitmap drawing programs like Paint. For instance, you can create a bitmap in Paint and then copy-paste it in PCE.

Create With The Private Character Editor

The toolbar has all the basic tools to make your first character from scratch.

The default tool is the Pencil for drawing on one square at a time. The Brush helps you draw 2×2 squares at a time.

The Straight Line tool, the Hollow Rectangle tool, the Filled Rectangle tool, the Hollow Ellipse tool, and the Filled Ellipse tool are just what they say.

The Free Form Selection tool and the Rectangular Selection tool select the different shapes you draw on the grid.

The Eraser tool removes 2×2 areas of drawing.

Now, it’s all about your creativity and the font you want to create. For instance, I created a skyline silhouette. How does it look? Tell me in the comments.

The Easier Way to Create a Character

Using a pre-existing font as a starting point can be easier. You can choose from any of the installed fonts for download fonts from the sources available online.

From the Menu, go to Window > Reference.

Choose the typeface you would like to use by clicking the Font button on the Reference screen.

Select the character you would like to use as the template for your own. Click OK to load it into the editor.

The PCE displays two windows now. The Reference window on the right is your guide. The blank Edit window on the left is your canvas.

Copy the Reference character with one of the selection tools on the toolbar. Select and then press Ctrl + C. Paste it on the Edit window with a Ctrl + V. You can close the Reference window to bring the Edit window front and center.

Go crazy – design your character with all the creativity at your disposal.

Save and Use Your Own Font or Symbol

The process to save a design is the same for both the above processes.

You have two options — associate the new character with a font family or with all fonts installed on your computer. For a specific font family, your custom character will be available exclusively from there.

Click the File menu and select Font Links and then click Yes on the next save prompt. Keep the Link with All Fonts option selected and click OK.

The character is now linked to the fonts in your system. To save the character with a specific hexadecimal code — click Edit and select Save Character from the menu to save it. You can associate and save the character to a different hexadecimal code too. Select Save Character As instead.

Use the character with the help of the Character Map on your system.

The new character can be found in the drop-down under All Fonts (Private Characters) or under a specific font (Private Characters) depending upon the choice of association in the earlier step. Select the character and hit copy. Now it can be pasted into any application.

Don’t get scared if you see a tiny black blob. Just increase its font size like as you would do with any other character.

All rules applicable to fonts also apply to the newly created character. It goes for all font functions like size, bold, italic, etc. Also, custom characters will not be available on other computers unless they are installed there too.

So, your own symbols and characters will work on printed documents but not with emails or shared documents as the recipients will not have it on their systems.

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Eva

August 15, 2018 at 1:20 am

Thanks, this info was super helpful! However, I am currently having a problem. I was able to use and create two symbols without an issue. Any of the ones I made after are invisible when I paste them into WPS Writer. How can I make them visible?

I want to build an alphabet. It is mostly regular letters, but a few characters are new. I guess I can use it in some sort of picture form so that others can read the characters. If I want them to use it though - write their words with the new characters, then they have to have that font. I'll find out how to make the font available to them.
Thank you for your help.

This is an interesting insight, but I have 2 very big factors that don't work with this.

1. All the characters have a limit of 50x50 pixels when my characters specifically require 80x100 pixels in order to be seen optimally as they would be too small to see the details - which are quite important for my language.

2. You can NOT create any characters in colour and are restricted to monochrome/black & white characters. This is particularly difficult and annoying as it is highly imperative for each of my characters to be in colour as most of them look very similar and the colour differentiation is the key to understanding whether it's an s, k, u, or p...

Okay, thank you very much Saikat for notifying me about this as I was previously unaware of the circumstances. I am quite delighted to hear that there are currently many new tools out in the world, as this very well will make my life much easier.

What simple tool can be available? I am not a professional . I just want
to create a smaller symbol, like the subscript.
I 've used this tool to create a subscript already.but it look too big, Thank you.

Hi All
kindly, can anyone explain the below part of the answer underneath as I am trying to import my private characters from one PC to another please.
"unless you save them into a separate font-file and distribute it together with your document."

Saikat
April 8, 2009
The user created fonts will work only on the machine, they were created, unless you save them into a separate font-file and distribute it together with your document.
Could it be that the ‘migration’ is causing problems to the adding of fonts in the new machine?

Heh, too bad this thing does not come with instructions. I am looking at it and am able to draw but have absolutely no idea about how to create a selective font like all of those fancy created fonts out there available for download.. I just want to be able to put my own symbols in a font for use in a book or to be able to freely select it as a font and start typing. Any suggestions?

I've made only about 120 other private characters without any problem like this and there are thousands of remaining empty blocks for other private characters. So I don't think it could be a space problem. Though I did experiment making one with just one bit filled and that one actually was able to save without the message popping up. Very strange.

The only program that I have running at the same time is "sticky notes" so I know it's not that. I went on task manager and it didn't seem like anything was taking a huge amount of RAM.

My Computer>Properties says I have 3GB available of RAM and I have over 200GB available on my hard drive.

I've restarted and shut down and still the message pops up if I try again.

I was able to migrate these private characters (I have hundreds of them) to another computer. But after that I was not able to add new private characters to file (EUDC) in the new computer. Anyone knows how?

The user created fonts will work only on the machine, they were created, unless you save them into a separate font-file and distribute it together with your document.
Could it be that the 'migration' is causing problems to the adding of fonts in the new machine?

Notepad? I don't think I have mentioned that anywhere.If you mean that you don't have PCE in your comp, then the only solution I think is to copy the .exe file from someone else's folder and copy that into your ...\Windows\System32\ folder. You can try that out though I am not sure it will work.

OK. I get the Private Character topic but how in the heck do I *easily* use the characters I create? I find that when I drag them into IE, they just show up as a box, even though I have the characters associated with all fonts.

If any knows how to make these accessible through an ALT+NNNN command PLEASE LET ME KNOW!!!

What the hell? How long has that been there? I noticed it the other day when I was playing with Windows 7, but I had no idea it wasn't new. Seriously, when was this introduced? XP? 2000? Not that I have any real use for this, but it's cool to know its there.

Saikat Basu is the Deputy Editor for Internet, Windows, and Productivity. After removing the grime of an MBA and a ten year long marketing career, he is now passionate about helping others improve their storytelling skills. He looks out for the missing Oxford comma and hates bad screenshots. But Photography, Photoshop, and Productivity ideas soothe his soul.